Matt Hardy has sounded off on the ongoing controversy surrounding Ricky Starks’ AEW status.

As noted, Starks has been on the sidelines from AEW for months, and upon speaking out about the situation at a recent GCW event, has been pulled from all future bookings with the promotion.

During the latest episode of his podcast, The Extreme Life of Matt Hardy, the TNA Wrestling star spoke out about the situation.

“I can’t speak into the reasoning they’re not using them, because I don’t know those details obviously,” Hardy said. “I can say, I grew to like Ricky Starks so much. I love me some Ricky Starks. We had a greeting, he would always hit me and said, ‘What’s up RN’. That’s what he would call me every time that I ran into him and that kind of became our thing back and forth. I’ll leave that to your imagination what it might be. I got a lot of love for Ricky Starks, I think he’s extremely talented, he’s extremely charismatic, I think he gets the wrestling business and I can see him being a big star in the future, especially if he gets the correct opportunity.”

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Hardy continued, “As far as guys being there under contract, I guess if there is a dispute and maybe someone voices an opinion that is contrary to your company or saying he doesn’t want to work there or whatever it may be, once again, I don’t know any of this, but I get Tony Khan holding someone under contract until the end of their deal, I mean, if they’re being paid, it is what it is. You signed a contract. That happens in business all the time, so that’s nothing new in pro wrestling. That’s one of those things that I’m not going to be too critical of because that’s just kind of how business is conducted in the big scheme of things.”

After his co-host asked about holding talent or refusing to release them if they’re unhappy or directly ask to be let go, Hardy stated, “It can be [within the company’s rights]. In theory, if you signed a contract, you have made this agreement to do that time, so it is what it is. Now, I’m very different. I could see if someone did not want to be — if I’m the boss and someone asked me, ‘Hey, I’m not happy here, I’d like to move on and do this or that’, I get that and I would probably think a little differently. If someone didn’t want to be here and I’m paying them just to sit at home, I would probably release people. I think after the Ethan Page deal where he asked for his release and he was granted his release and then he shows up in NXT and becomes a hit, I don’t think that’s going to happen anytime in the near future.”

(H/T to Fightful.com for transcribing the above quotes.)

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